Whitehall harriers Tessa Hopkins and Aiden Borkenhagen repeated as the Zephyrs’ top runners after competing in the District XI Class 3A Cross Country Championships on Oct. 25 at DeSales University.

Hopkins placed 59th of 76 in the girls race with a time of 25:23.44.

“I feel like the heat got a bunch of us. It started to bother me as soon as I got out of the woods and went up that mini hill,” Hopkins said. “I did a nice pace starting out, and I was more cautious on the hills, running on the dry patches. Toward the end, all of my teammates were yelling, ‘Come on, Tessa. Last one, best one,’ and that motivated me to sprint really hard. I definitely had one of the best finishes I’ve had.”

Borkenhagen placed 62nd of 102 runners in the boys race with a time of 20:22.38.

“It was a pretty good day,” he said. “I ran 6:00 first mile. I did the second mile better, like 6:30, a lot better than [leagues], but I feel like the third mile, I slowed down.”

Nazareth’s Gio Mastromanaco was the boys district champ with his time of 16:00.01, and Parkland’s Paul Abeln placed second in 16:23.66.

Freedom’s Dylan Boyle took third place in 16:36.73, and Parkland’s Ethan Willard was fourth in 16:48.28.

Parkland’s Colin McGuigan came in fifth in 16:50.92, followed by three Easton runners: Aaron Marcus in 17:08.72, James Viglianti in 17:10.25, and Evan Guydish in 17:10.79.

Nazareth’s JT Cunningham placed ninth in 17:11.21, and Parkland’s Jacob Barnes was 10th in 17:19.46.

Boys team results were Parkland 40, Easton 55, Nazareth 69, Emmaus 99, Southern Lehigh 165, Freedom 184, Northampton 224, Stroudsburg 227, Liberty 248, Pocono Mountain East 282, Pleasant Valley 298, Bangor 332, Pocono Mountain West 367, and Whitehall 389.

Girls team results were Emmaus 43, Easton 46, Parkland 89, Southern Lehigh 93, Stroudsburg 154, Nazareth 163, Northampton 173, Liberty 194, and Whitehall 282.

Emmaus’s Madelyn McCartney was the girls district champ with her time of 19:13.53, Freedom’s Ava Fihlman placed second in 19:42.37, and Pocono Mountain West’s Kaya Meler was third in 19:51.84.

Emmaus’s Payton Campbell placed fourth in 20:22.33, Parkland’s Lana Hurwitz came in fifth in 20:29.18, Easton’s Sidney Hutt was sixth in 20:36.49, and Easton’s Faith Belote was seventh in 20:41.12.

Parkland’s Harshita Rajeshkuma finished in eighth place in 20:47.68, Easton’s Lama Mahmoud came in ninth in 20:59.42, and Northampton’s Liv Jusinski was 10th in 21:01.98.

The top 10 received district medals and will compete at the PIAA Class 3A State Cross Country Championships on Nov. 4 in Hershey along with the girls teams from Emmaus and Easton and the boys teams from Parkland and Easton.